Article snippet: MORE edged toward a harder line with Saudi Arabia on Thursday. But the shift came only after the administration faced pressure for a response to the apparent killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi that critics condemned as timorous and unsteady. “Their message is muddled in part because they haven’t settled on policy,” GOP strategist Alex Conant said. “It seems very familiar compared with how they have handled other crises. They often talk before they know what their policy is.” Referring to the media blitz Trump has undertaken as midterm elections loom on Nov. 6, Conant added, “The president is doing so many interviews but he doesn’t know what he wants to say about Saudi Arabia.” One problem for the administration is that Trump appears to be caught between two competing imperatives — his desire to appear strong and his reluctance to admit mistakes. In this case, the most obvious way to show strength is to stand up to the Saudis. But doing so would look like a tacit admission that his administration — and in particular his son-in-law, senior White House adviser MORE — had erred in investing so much faith in Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who is widely suspected of complicity in Khashoggi’s alleged murder. Late on Thursday afternoon, Trump made his most direct remarks on Khashoggi. In quick succession, he told reporters from the New York Times that “unless the miracle of all miracles happens, I would acknowledge that he’s dead,” and then made broadly simi... Link to the full article to read more